Following Aristotle's order of inquiry in NE VII, I turn to his general theory of pleasure and its place in the good life. This topic is investigated twice in the Nicomachean
Ethics, in the form in which we have the treatise. There is one discussion in VII, a
book which also belongs to the Eudemian Ethics; here Aristotle moves to the general
question of pleasure after examining incontinence. The other account occurs at the
beginning of Book X--not a common book--where it succeeds the lengthy discussion of friendship in VIII and IX. In what follows I consider both accounts and shall
be mainly concerned with the lessons they hold in common. There are interesting
differences, but the most significant lines of thought are the same in both, though
more developed in X.
1

Whether this verdict is shared depends, of course, on what one considers 'most
significant.' If we assume that Aristotle's primary task is to explain what pleasure is,
we may make out important divergences between VII and X. Book X seems to suggest a different answer to the question 'What is pleasure?' from the answer given in
VII; and it has even been argued
2 that VII is not concerned with this question at all,
but with the different problem of characterising pleasures, or the things that please.
The difference, roughly, is that between asking 'What is it to enjoy something?' and
asking 'What is common to everything enjoyed or enjoyable?' But in neither book
does Aristotle study pleasure because he wants above all to know what pleasure is.
He seeks to understand pleasure to determine its ethical significance.
3 From this
point of view differences between the accounts are not fundamental unless they indicate divergent doctrines about the rôle of pleasure in the good life for man and, in
particular, about the relation of pleasure to human excellence and excellent activity.

On this score, however, his positive conclusions in both books are substantially
the same. The detail of the arguments differs considerably, but this is perhaps because
they respond to different concerns. In both, Aristotle maintains that the highest good
is necessarily pleasant; but in X he is more concerned to locate his position in relation
to the less discriminating hedonism of Eudoxus, whereas in VII his main adversaries

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